The mystery of inequity: Modeling the influence of intergenerational access on intellective competence

Abstract

There has been a vast amount of research that has examined achievement differences, particularly by race (Anyon, 1997; Bowen & Bok, 1998; Clark, 1965; Gordon, 1999; Jencks & Phillips, 1998; Ogbu, 2003). Much of this research has accounted for parents' income, education, and occupation, but few have examined these factors intergenerationally (Grant, 2005; Kalil, Pattillo, & Payne, 2004; Mandara, Greene, & Varner, 2006; Miller, 1995; Phillips, Brooks-Gunn, Duncan, Klebanov & Crane, 1998), accounted for wealth, and statistically modeled the individual developmental trajectories of the children. Using multilevel growth curve modeling in SAS PROC MIXED, this study examined this using the Child Development Supplement to the Panel Study of Income Dynamics. ^ Results suggested that, (1) wealth has a small to negligible direct relationship with achievement; (2) permanent income has a greater association than wealth and was the driving indicator of financial capital; (3) occupational cultural capital had a positive relationship on both the level and rate of developed achievement; (4) the grandparents' financial capital had a small to negligible direct effect; (5) the grandparents' financial capital did account for a meaningful amount of variation in achievement differences by race and gender over and above the parent/caregivers' financial capital; (6) the intergenerational model accounted for 50% and 71% of the mathematics and reading achievement differences by race, respectively; and, moreover, (7) the achievement differences between Black and White females was almost negligible for mathematics and was negligible for reading. ^ Policy implications were directed toward the need for policies of greater economic development and the increased proliferation of supplementary educational institutions, specifically in marginalized communities. It was argued in the conclusion that it is an imperative that the United States address the inequitable access to the various forms of capital by concentrating efforts toward strategies of social justice and the equitable development of intellective competence. ^